2004 - HYP001 - REVIEWS

Jockey Slut [Feb/March 2004]Hit of the Month [garage]“Dance music is rife with mediocrity. Producers move in packs, as scenes evolve stepwise and dubstep is in many ways no different. Here Kode 9 uses covers to challenge that norm. Where “Stalker” was once a Junior Boys love song, he turns it to obsession, amid sparse soca-step shards. “Sign Of The Dub,” however, is truly remarkable: a beatless dub cover of the Prince classic. No percussion means no momentum: you’re immobilized by its immense bass-pulse and delayed reggae stabs. Police sirens wail into the distance while Daddi Gee growls: “Some people say/a man never truly ‘appy/unless a nex’ man/truly dies … the times/it’s the times.” Innovation and zeitgeist in one.”

Mixmag [April 2004]"This is the ultimate anti-anthem. If you want Eskidance to make noize or 4x4 to bounce DON’T play this awesome tune. Built around a beatless bass-pulse, it’s a startling dub Prince cover at garage tempo, with no momentum. Played in a rave it turns heads and brings the dance to a standstill. Incredible abstract shizzle."

Urb [USA] [March 2004]“Emerging from London’s furtive dub-step enclave, Kode9 strikes gold by hooking up with spoken word sorcerer Daddi Gee. As deep as Rhythm & Sound, as funky as Moodyman and as filthy as grime’s fiercest, this is head stunningly fresh and shrouded in claustrophobic atmospheric pressure. Sounding like a dervish ritual for existential dreads, this is death disco for deviant dub fiends” – Kevin Martin / The Bug

I-D [March 2004]“Covers are generally shite. Or a cash in. But here dubstep garage pioneer Kode 9 returns covers to the underground’s cutting edge. “Stalker” is a rework of the much-hyped electro balladeers Junior Boys. But where there was once love, now there’s twisted percussive darkness. If, however, you think that’s dark, try Kode 9’s rework of Prince. It’s beatless, intense and paralyzing. Daddi Gee’s booming voice reaches out through the unsettled night. “The times, man… it’s the times.”

The Wire [March 2004]“Kode9 kicks off Hyperdub.com’s in-house label with. . .two of the darkest, most suffocating tracks ever to come out of the garage/reggae hybrid called dubstep. The entirely beatless ‘Sign of the Dub’ features Daddi Gee muttering nonsequiturs in a molasses baritone like LKJ in a K hole. His cousin lights up a spliff ‘for the very first time’ and in the next phrase is smoking rock; ‘I can’t understand when a rocket ship explode/yet everybody still want fi fly.’ For the five minute duration of the track, time effectively stops, a low bass pulse stilling your heartbeat into hibernating half-speed while pads flicker like the green flash of dusk. ‘Stalker’ is more familiar fare, laying down a swathe of spaceship hum over stop-start syncopations. But its techsteppy grimace is no less paranoid, and the periodic flare of backspinning vinyl sounds like a mind in meltdown.”

Xlr8r [April 2004]"Hyperdub/dubplate keeper Kode9 launches his Hyperdub imprint with two plates of minimalist UK grime arrangements wrapped around ultra-lethargic MC/spoken wordist Daddi Gee’s fathoms-deep voice. On the first slab, a throbbing bass tone, a semi-open hi-hat and the occasional eternally achoing dub chord are all that jab at Daddi’s recitation of Prince’s ‘Sign of the Times’, while half-time garridge fuels the spooky flipside, ‘Stalker’. ‘Spit’, the second record finds Gee havin’ at Public Enemy’s ‘Welcome to the Terrordrome’ in front of kode9’s chunky, haunted skarage. Order this one up at your shops."

IDJ [April 2004]“Irresistably fresh, improbably deep and radiantly warm, the sonic vapour trails from a dystopian soundscape, as electronic music targets the next millenium. Rich, cavernous reverbs drench the baritone boom of Gee's effortlessly cool delivery, as these dubstep escapees follow Rhythm and Sound's path on the Berlin to Kingston freeway. Lost in clouds of weed smoke and urban smog, this is minimal and clinically paranoid.”